


An Unfinished Memory

by mizdiz



Category: The Walking Dead & Related Fandoms, The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: 1960s, 1970s, Alternate Universe, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, Period-Typical Sexism, Recreational Drug Use, Slow Burn, Vietnam War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-15 12:28:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 21,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29064339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mizdiz/pseuds/mizdiz
Summary: He made a promise he would never tell her he's in love with her, because she deserves more than a poor country boy with a draft notice in his mailbox and a one-way ticket to Vietnam, meanwhile the only thing she wants in this world is for someone to make her breakfast.
Relationships: Daryl Dixon/Carol Peletier
Comments: 5
Kudos: 26





	1. 1966: A Good Start

**Author's Note:**

> hello! welcome to a new story! 
> 
> this will take place over a span of several years, during the vietnam war. so like, as a general cw, war and typical war violence will be a prominent theme. there's also gonna be period-typical racisim/sexism/homophobia/etc, just so you're aware going in. other than that i don't want to spoil it
> 
> have fun! hopefully!
> 
> -diz

**PART I.**

**How to Build a Treehouse**

Flour, egg, baking powder, buttermilk—Carol carefully measured the ingredients one-by-one from a recipe she knew by heart and stirred the pancake batter until it was smooth. Then came her favorite part. The recipe called for a fourth cup of chocolate chips, but she always put in a full cup shamelessly. She knew her father would complain, as he always did on days she made pancakes for the two of them, about how there was more chocolate than bread. Carol wasn’t sure why this was a source of discontent. In her opinion she should be praised. Especially on the rare occasions like that particular Monday morning where she’d gone to the trouble of making her own whipped cream to go on top, which she only did on the days where she really needed a good start.

On the griddle she waited until small bubbles began to form in the batter and then flipped the pancake effortlessly, the cooked side a perfect golden brown.

No one made pancakes better than she did, not since her mother died and passed down the title, but part of her missed having pancakes made for her. She hoped that one day she would find someone who would love her enough to make her pancakes for breakfast. Just as long as they put in a full cup of chocolate chips, instead of a measly fourth.

As she always did, Carol made enough pancakes for two, setting a pair of plates down on either end of the kitchen table, a short stack artfully placed on each with a generous dollop of whipped cream on top.

As she always did, Carol ate alone, her father still asleep in his bedroom, his bed occasionally creaking under his weight as he rolled over and coughed from deep in his chest. As she always did, Carol pretended she wasn’t worried about that cough.

Carol tried not to take his absence at the table personally. His new job at the meat packing plant was much better than his old one at the railroad, but he was putting in twelve hour days, at least. He came home late each night after Carol had already prepared and eaten supper, and slept until six in the morning, giving himself less than a half-hour to shrug on his uniform, grab a thermos of coffee and the lunch box Carol filled for him daily, and drive the three miles down the dirt road to the plant. He promised every night, “Tomorrow, honey, I’ll come join you at the table, and you can tell me all about your day. I just need to get used to these crazy hours.”

He’d been working his new hours for a month now, and hadn’t shared a meal with Carol once.

She always set two plates, though. Every single time.

Carol listened to the radio as she ate. It was tuned to 102.7, which was a pop-rock station from inside the city that her cheap radio barely reached. She hummed along to a staticky version of “California Dreamin’,'' her mouth full as she savored every bite, praying the magic of chocolate would give her the courage to get through the day, and maybe even enjoy it too, although she wasn’t greedy. She’d settle for simple survival.

“I don’t know how you listen to that garbage,” Carol’s dad said ten minutes later when he came into the kitchen in his uniform. Without sitting, he plucked up the plate of pancakes left for him and took a big bite. Carol, who was washing her plate at the sink, paused to fill her father’s thermos with fresh coffee.

“It’s Bob Dylan, what’s wrong with Bob Dylan?” she asked. The radio was playing “Like a Rolling Stone” at varying volumes as the station came in and out. 

“He shoulda stuck with folk music. Did you put a whole Hershey’s factory in these or what?” He stuffed one more forkful of pancake into his mouth before calling it good and taking the thermos from Carol with a muffled thanks. He coughed into his elbow, and then planted a kiss on Carol’s cheek.

“You have a good first day. Behave yourself. Stay out of trouble, and make some new friends. I’ll be here for dinner and you can tell me all about it.”

“Looking forward to it,” Carol replied, thinking it would be unlikely that she’d exchange more than a few pleasantries when her father got home. More than likely he’d come through the door smelling like dead pig, would grab a couple bites off his plate, and then apologize before crashing.

The screen door slammed behind him with a clatter and the sound of his pickup thrumming to life came from the driveway. Carol finished washing her plate and then took a few bites of her father’s abandoned leftovers before dumping the remainder in the trash. Such a waste, but pancakes wouldn’t save in the fridge all day.

When she finished the rest of the dishes, Carol checked the time. It was just after six thirty. The bus was supposed to be there at the top of the hour exactly, but she was planning to get there at least ten minutes early, just in case. She wasn’t going to risk missing the bus. Not on her very first day.

The stop was a seven minute walk away—she’d timed herself walking to it every day for a week to be sure—so that gave her just enough time to take one last good look at herself in the mirror before heading out.

Flipping on the light, Carol entered her bedroom. The walls were lavender with an off-white trim and she didn’t like it at all, but she wasn’t going to complain. There were two bedrooms in the tiny house and her father had given her the bigger of the two, and she was fairly certain it was because he wanted to be kind, and not because he felt it would be too girly to sleep in a room painted purple. Fairly certain.

Carol stood before her vanity—the nicest piece of furniture in the place, which had once belonged to her mother—and gave herself a once over.

She was wearing a knee-length, pleated skirt she’d sewn herself out of a yellow fabric she’d had her eye on for months before she’d saved enough pocket change to buy it. Her blouse was cream colored and button-up, and she had a red cardigan over top of it. She was wearing white pantyhoes that had a run in them at the hip, but she’d brushed it over with clear nail polish to keep it from getting worse. Unless someone lifted her skirt they’d all be none the wiser to the minor fashion faux pas, and she had no intentions of lifting her skirt for anyone. Certainly not on the first day.

Her hair was a chaotic mess she tamed to the best of her ability, but she knew to pick her battles, and getting her unruly curls to do what she wanted wasn’t a fight she could win. Instead, she had tied them up atop her head with a ribbon and said a quick prayer that they’d stay that way. That was, frankly, the best she could do. 

Satisfied, Carol slipped on her brown boots and plucked her backpack off the end of her lumpy, secondhand, wire frame bed.

It was time to go.

The weather outside was brisk on that early January morning—low fifties at best, but probably more like mid-forties—and Carol pulled her cardigan around herself tighter as she made her way to the bus stop at the corner next to a highway sign a car must have hit at some point, because it stood at a ninety degree angle.

Checking her watch, she found she was ten minutes early as expected. She kicked lazily at the weeds growing in the dirt with the toe of her boot and waited, trying not to overthink the day to come, and failing spectacularly.

The bus wasn’t as prompt as she was, showing up five after the hour. Hers was the last stop among the poor rural kids who commuted to O’Brien High. Having to drive the furthest distance, one would have thought they’d send one of the better busses, but the school bus that rolled up looked like it had been chauffeuring students up and down the highway since the Great War. The brakes squealed like a dog getting gutted, and a dark cloud of foul-smelling smoke puffed out of the exhaust pipe.

The bus driver opened the doors—which moved much too slowly and creaked like the door to an ancient, haunted mansion—and he looked at her with a vaguely irritated expression, as if he was annoyed that her mere existence meant he had to make an extra stop on his route.

Carol let the bus driver’s apparent dislike of her slide right off like water. The bus didn’t lower all the way to the ground the way it was meant to, so she took hold of the handrail and hoisted herself up onto the short flight of stairs, smiling brightly at him the whole time.

“Thanks,” she said when she got on board. The driver grunted at her as she turned to survey her seating options.

Predictably, all the kids were already divided into the cliques they likely formed at the beginning of the school year back in August, or maybe over the course of years. For sixty miles there were a handful of towns that were so small they could barely claim the title, and all the kids had the same choice of schools, unless they wanted to drive well over an hour every day into the city. It was possible that most of the kids had known each other for years, and she was now the odd one out.

“Sit down or I’ll start drivin’ while you stand there lollygagging, and it won’t be on me when you fall on your rear-end,” the driver barked at her, making her jump. A couple of kids snickered, but most weren’t paying attention.

Near the front of the bus there was a boy leaning over the seats smooth-talking a couple giggling girls. Behind them, a pair of identical twins wearing matching dresses sat with their heads close, whispering. A bored-looking boy stared out of the window while a pretty girl ranted animatedly at him about something or other, gesticulating wildly with her hands as she told her story. Everyone appeared to have at least one friend, except for a single girl sitting at the very back.

Making an executive decision, Carol squared her shoulders and walked down the aisle past the handful of open seats in the middle of the bus and came to a stop beside the girl.

“Do you mind if I sit here?” Carol asked politely. The girl raised her eyebrows at Carol and laughed a little.

“Uh, if you want to, go right ahead.” Carol thought she heard her mutter under her breath, “Your funeral.”

Carol took her backpack off and set it down at her feet as she settled in on the misshapen, uncomfortable seat. She smiled at the girl and held out her hand.

“I’m Carol,” she said. The girl stared at her for a beat before taking Carol’s outstretched hand in hers and giving it a solid shake.

“Michonne.”

“Nice to meet you.”

“Yeah. You, too.”

Michonne was an attractive black girl with a big afro and was wearing a purple, patterned knit sweater over top of a pair of orange pedal pushers. 

“So let me guess,” Michonne said, leaning back in her seat and looking Carol up and down. “You’re new here.”

“That obvious, huh? My daddy and I moved here from Atlanta the second week of December. There wasn’t much point in starting school until after Christmas vacation.”

“Oh, you must be who took over old lady Midge’s place, huh? That grungy house a half-mile off the highway?”

“That’s the one.”

“Wow. That place is a trash dump.”

Carol laughed and nodded.

“I know.”

“Tell me it’s at least an upgrade from your last pad.”

“Nah, downgrade, actually. It’s just my daddy and me, and he wasn’t making enough money to afford our place in the city. The meat plant down here offered him a decent wage and he took it, but it meant we had to move.”

“You from Atlanta?”

“Yeah, born and raised.”

“So you haven’t spent much time in small towns, huh?”

“Not really. Before my grandma died we’d sometimes go to her place a few miles south of Macon. I always hated it. There wasn’t a damn thing to do, and her radio didn’t even get any of the good shows.”

“Welcome to the country, city girl.”

“I guess. What’s the school like?”

Michonne snorted. She said, “I’m probably not the right person to ask.”

“Why not?”

Michonne furrowed her brow at Carol, giving her a look like she thought she might be stupid.

“I don’t exactly ‘fit in’ all that well. You might notice a few key differences between me and everyone else.”

Carol bit her lower lip, not wanting to state the obvious thing.

“It’s alright, it’s not a secret, I know I’m black,” Michonne said, smiling a little at Carol’s blush. More seriously, she added, “Our school’s technically been integrated since the bill was passed, but besides me and my brother at the junior high you’re not gonna find any other negros wandering the halls. I went to colored schools ‘til my freshman year. I begged my momma to let me stay, but she said it was important for me to go to a white school. Said it was making a statement, plus the books aren’t all falling apart and ten years outta date. But tell you what, this is my third year and it’s still hell, so I hope whatever statement I’m making it ends up being worth it.”

Carol looked down at her lap, embarrassed by Michonne’s frankness.

“The other students are bad to you, then?” she asked. In her periphery Michonne shrugged.

“One-on-one not so much, least not all of them, but it’s different when we’re all together, like in class or in the cafeteria...or the bus. People don’t wanna be seen with me.”

Carol snapped her head up and said, “I don’t care if we’re seen together,” perhaps too passionately, if the way Michonne bit back a laugh was any indication.

“I appreciate it, city girl, but remember, you’re the new kid. People are gonna notice who you do and don’t hang around, so you better think about it. And if tomorrow you’re sitting up front giggling with the other girls, well, I won’t hold it against you, alright?”

Carol sat up straight, indignant. She’d never considered herself to be prejudiced, but even more than that she didn’t like being the person people expected her to be. She had an intimate desire somewhere deep inside that she couldn’t purge that made her want to be contrary; to misbehave.

“I like this seat just fine,” she said. “Assuming you don’t mind my company.”

Michonne chuckled and shook her head, like she found Carol endearing.

“No. I don’t mind at all.”

“Friends, then?”

Michonne shrugged.

“Friends,” she agreed. “Although…” She lifted her hand and tugged on one of Carol’s curls that was falling away from the ribbon holding it in place and scrunched her nose.

“Although what?” 

“We can be friends,” Michonne said, letting go and watching the curl spring back into place. “But only on the condition that you let me help you figure out how to take care of your frizzy-ass hair.”

*

Compared to O’Brien, Carol’s old high school in Atlanta was a cathedral.

“ _That’s_ the school?” she asked Michonne in a hushed tone when the bus pulled into the lot. “It’s so small.”

“You’re looking at it like it’s a one-room schoolhouse, pull yourself together,” Michonne said with a scoff.

“I don’t mind it, it’s just...how do all the students _fit_?”

“Well, it’s not a one-room schoolhouse, but it’s not swarming like a college campus either. Better face it, city girl, you’re living in the country now.”

Carol clucked her tongue and shrugged.

“Guess so.” Around her the other kids were crowding the front of the bus in the loosest definition of a single-file line, and Carol slid out of her seat, shouldering her backpack. “Shall we?” she asked Michonne, who was scooting out behind her.

“After you,” Michonne said. She made a show of gesturing for Carol to go ahead. Grinning, Carol went to join the mayhem at the front.

The inside of the building was more jarring than the outside. There were two floors and a basement; Carol’s school in Atlanta had four floors and an attached gymnasium.

“Where’s my locker?” Carol asked Michonne, showing her a pink sheet of paper that had her locker number and class schedule in faded typewriter ink. 

“It’s close to mine,” Michonne said, scanning the paper. “All the juniors are in the same section, and pretty much have matching schedules, too, since there aren’t that many of us. Our classes are the same. I’ll be able to show you around, if you want.”

“I definitely want,” Carol said with relief, gesturing for Michonne to take the lead this time. 

The two of them made their way through the narrow halls. It didn’t escape Carol that the other students stared and pursed their lips like they’d all taken big bites of raw lemon when they saw her walking in tandem with Michonne. In response, Carol stood up straighter and fell in step even closer with her new friend, making sure there was no doubt that they were a pair.

The attention was harder to brush off by the time they reached their first class of the day and were forced to face a concentrated amount of staring the second they set foot inside. Eyes fell on Carol and she knew instantly that she stuck out like a sore thumb. The entire school was made up of students that had grown up together, and she was the Skittle that got tossed into the M&M bowl.

Luckily, however, Carol wasn’t one to buckle under scrutiny. With her head held high, she put on her best and brightest smile and flashed it at her new classmates, most of whom averted their gazes hastily.

“Where do we sit?” she whispered to Michonne out of the corner of her mouth.

“Well, there are no assigned seats, although I tend to make my home in the back row, whether I want to or not. But if you don’t feel like committing social suicide you can sit wherever you please.” 

“Show me the way,” Carol said stubbornly. Michonne rolled her eyes, but was clearly biting back a smile as she adjusted the pile of books she held in her arms and started down the row of desks. One bulky boy with short blonde hair visibly angled away from her when she passed by, and when Carol followed she made it a point to “accidentally” bump her hip into the boy’s desk, causing his pencil to roll onto the floor.

“Sorry,” she said insincerely, and continued on.

There were three desks in the back—two in either corner and one in the middle—and the one in the far left was occupied by a boy in an overworn flannel with a leather vest over top of it. The boy was bent forward, doodling something on a sheet of notebook paper, giving Carol a clear look at his back where she saw the angel wings stitched into his vest.

When he noticed the girls’ approach he glanced up. He nodded subtly at Michonne—the kindest gesture Carol had witnessed anyone give her all morning—and Michonne nodded back, before taking a seat in the other corner, leaving the middle desk up for grabs. Carol plopped her books on top of it, claiming it as her own.

"Hi," Carol said to the boy, the cheerful smile still on her face. The boy continued to doodle but then paused, as if suddenly realizing he was being talked to. He peered at her through shaggy bangs, his eyebrows knitted together. 

Carol thrusted her hand out and said, "My name's Carol. What's yours?"

The boy stared at Carol's outstretched hand like it was a bomb about to detonate. Undeterred, she waited him out until he finally grasped her hand in his, dropping it in a millisecond, as he muttered, "Daryl." 

The brief contact was just long enough for Carol to feel that he had rough calluses on his fingers, like all of her father’s coworkers from the railroad—the kind that told of hard work, and she wondered idly about what kind of person this Daryl kid had to be to have workers’ hands at such a young age.

From her other side Michonne was snickering. She leaned in close to Carol and said in a stage whisper, "Daryl's not exactly a chatty Cathy."

Daryl narrowed his eyes at Michonne, but proceeded to prove her point by saying nothing in his defense. Instead, he turned back to his doodling, ignoring them both. Carol craned her neck to see what he was so intently drawing. 

On the piece of notebook paper there was a picture of a house surrounded by trees. The trees were loosely sketched with minimal detail, but the house, while rough, was intricate, with even lines depicting bricks, and half-open shutters on the windows drawn in proper perspective. Carol watched, impressed, as he shaded part of the roof, unaware of his spectator. Next to him on the desk there were textbooks that had seen better days, with pieces of paper shoved haphazardly in between pages and beneath the covers, and on them Carol could see bits of other doodles, all of them different, but all of them incorporating houses or buildings of some sort.

"That's very good," she said. "Why do you draw houses? Do you want to be an architect or something?" 

Daryl's head snapped up. Instinctively he draped his forearm over his paper, hiding his drawing from view.

"Why don't you mind your business?" he grunted.

"Sorry," she said with a shrug. "I just thought it was nice, is all."

Daryl eyed her over, like he couldn't tell what to make of her. Wordlessly, he flipped his paper over and leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, facing forward. Carol casted a questioning glance at Michonne, who simply mouthed, "I told you so," and focused her attention on getting her books organized on her desk.

With a huff Carol took a moment to inspect her other classmates.

They were, frankly, unremarkable. A gaggle of farm kids, each nearly indistinguishable from the next. Maybe that’s why she’d already gravitated towards Michonne, and the quiet Daryl character, too. She didn’t need to be an empath to tell there was more personality in the two of them than in the rest of the students combined. 

A couple minutes before the bell rang the pair of twins from the bus approached a jockish boy sitting in the third row. He was laughing with a friend when the girls came up beside him and stood there until he noticed them. 

“Yeah?” he asked bluntly. The twins put on identical, solemn expressions that still managed to have an air of flirtation about them.

“We heard what happened,” said one of them in a somber tone.

“We’re awfully sorry,” said the other.

“The boy turned bright pink and averted his eyes, mumbling, “Right. That all?” 

“We just wanted you to know we’re here for you.”

“And we’ll listen if you ever need to talk.” 

Carol wasn’t the only one eavesdropping—the other students were starting to glance their way. The boy rubbed the nape of his neck, his cheeks growing darker, when he realized he was on display, and he told the girls, “I don’t need to cry on your shoulder like some queer. Why don’t you go on now and leave me be?” 

The girls tsked their tongues in unison and shook their heads sadly at him, not appearing offended in the least, as though they thought his words were stemming from some deep-seated grief inside. They wandered off to their desks without another word, leaving the kid ripe as a tomato. He tried resuming his conversation, but his friend would no longer look him in the eye.

“What was that about?” Carol asked Michonne in a whisper.

“Not sure,” she said.

“It’s his brother,” Daryl said quietly, surprising both Carol and Michonne.

“What about him?” Carol asked. Daryl threaded his pencil between his fingers and didn’t look at her when he spoke.

“Went to ‘Nam,” he said. “And came home in a bag. My brother works with his daddy. Told me he took a wrong step in a minefield and got blown right outta his boots.”

“Oh. Poor thing,” Carol murmured. 

It wasn’t the first time she’d heard of it happening—brothers, fathers, and sons going off to war and never coming back. Her history teacher back in Atlanta had gone on indefinite leave, and rumor had it that it was because his nineteen year old son got hit in the head by friendly fire, of all things. A kid who worked with her dad on the railroad had gotten his draft letter two years ago, and a month before he was meant to come home lost both his legs. Two months into rehabilitation, he told his nurse the bullet should have hit his skull instead, and she’d thought it was just a bad joke until he put a pistol in his mouth that night. 

How many of the boys in this classroom, Carol couldn’t help but wonder, would get their diploma next year, and their draft notice right after?

“It’s not fair,” she said. “The way they send boys off to die like that, with no say in the matter.”

Michonne made a noise of agreement, but Daryl snorted. Frowning, Carol asked, “What’s so funny?”

Again, Daryl didn’t look at her. He had flipped his drawing back over and was rubbing the dull point of his pencil at an angle on the paper, smearing lead in a careful, purposeful motion. 

“Nothin’. Just a stupid thing to waste your time thinkin’ about,” he said after a beat. “There ain’t nothin’ about war that’s ever been fair.”

*

Michonne and Daryl ate lunch together at the rattiest table in the cafeteria. It was sat underneath a light with a perpetually flickering bulb, and one of the legs was shorter than the rest, making it wobble if they didn’t stick a lunch tray underneath it.

They had a routine. They both brought their lunches in brown paper sacks, and never mentioned to the other how sad their mediocre meals were. In fact, they didn’t speak at all, which Daryl considered a blessing. Michonne’s company was nice—they were both social pariahs, but if they stuck together they didn’t have to be alone. He wouldn’t go as far as to say they were friends, mainly because he knew next to nothing about her despite years of being an outcast with her, but he appreciated the service they provided to one another; the predictability of it.

Which is why he was thrown entirely off kilter when Carol, the new girl with that peppy smile, followed the two of them to the reject table and took a seat with confidence, like she’d been doing it every day of her life. 

“Hope you don’t mind if I join you two, Daryl. Michonne offered,” she said cheerfully, sliding in beside Michonne. As she had done multiple times that day, Michonne smirked at Daryl, knowing perfectly well that he wasn’t a conversationalist, and clearly loving every second of his floundering. The three of them had every class together, and for the first time in his life Daryl wished he went to a bigger school just so he could hide from this girl who seemed determined to befriend him.

“‘S fine,” he muttered. It wasn’t fine. He was going insane. She kept asking him questions. _How was your break? Do you draw often? Can I borrow your pencil?_ He couldn’t be expected to live under such conditions. 

He wasn't the only one whose day was full of wondering about what this new girl's deal was. People were curious about her. He knew, because he'd heard them. He could easily be the town gossip if he ever got the urge—people always assumed he wasn't listening and talked freely around him. But Daryl was always listening.

_"You check out that new chick? She's a fox,"_ Walter Douglas had whispered to his buddy at their neighboring lockers during passing period.

_"Yeah, but she keeps hanging around Dixon and that—"_ his buddy had said, calling Michonne a name that made Daryl want to throw a punch, but she'd told him more than once that he'd be fighting a losing battle and it'd be better for both of them to ignore it. 

Daryl would be lying if he said Carol hadn't piqued his interest. It wasn't often that anybody new came to town, especially not from the city. She'd mentioned that she was from Atlanta in passing, but she hadn't needed to—Daryl could tell. For one thing her accent wasn't as strong as his and most of the other kids, and she wore nail polish with glitter in it, which he'd never seen the country girls do. Plus she seemed to be constantly claustrophobic, as if everything was just a little bit too small for her liking. No, she was city through-and-through, and Daryl hadn't the first clue on what would possess someone to make such a drastic change. He'd been living in the same place since the day he was born, and so could say with authority that it sucked. Big time.

"Daryl," Michonne said suddenly, snapping him out of his thoughts. "Carol asked you a question."

"Huh?" He glanced at Carol who was looking at him like she was patiently waiting for something.

"I asked if you'd like a cookie. Double chocolate chip. I baked them myself." She pushed a tupperware container in his direction and he saw a small stack of cookies inside. His instinct was to say no, but his sack lunch today was nothing but a single piece of bologna with mustard stuck between a couple pieces of stale white bread.

"Thanks," he grunted, accepting the offering. He took a bite and almost honest-to-god moaned at the way the chocolate melted delicately over his tongue. It was just the right consistency—not too hard, and not too soft—and Daryl couldn't remember the last time he'd had something that tasted so good. His daddy had drank and smoked most of their money, and hunting had been a bust lately. He’d been living, almost literally, on crumbs. Still, he thought, how embarrassing was he? Almost losing control over a damn cookie. Pathetic.

"S'good," he said lamely, spitting crumbs.

"Then take another," she said. "Go on," she insisted when he eyed the tupperware, wanting very badly to have a second but being too proud. "I love baking but I never have anyone to share it with."

"Guess I will, if you're gonna insist," he mumbled. 

He plucked up another and this time tried to savor it. Michonne must have noticed, because she nudged Carol's shoulder and said, "Maybe that's the trick. Keep feeding him treats and he'll warm up to you. Kinda like a dog."

Daryl casted her a nasty glare, blush blooming, but Carol grinned and said, "I'm up to the challenge. Think he'd take another?"

She held out the container and cocked an eyebrow. Daryl thrummed his fingertips on the table and finally gave in.

"Shut it," he said when both girls laughed at him. Usually, the laughter would make him mad and insecure, but it seemed good-natured. Friendly, even. Was this banter? Was he bantering?

He was starting to get the distinct impression that this new girl was about to shake things up, and he wasn't sure he was ready for it. Not that it mattered much. Change wasn't one to wait around for everyone to synchronize their watches—it would come when it pleased, and that was all there was to it.

Well, he figured, at least the cookies were good.

*

"Why are you so obsessed with Daryl Dixon?" Michonne asked, exasperated, after Carol asked her yet another question about the mysterious boy. School was out and the two of them were in the back of the same rundown bus they'd been in that morning. Carol had survived her first day, and with no battle wounds to speak of.

"I'm not obsessed," she clarified. "He just intrigues me, that's all."

"He _intrigues_ you." Michonne snorted. "Honestly, it's like you're going out of your way to join the leper colony, hanging around Daryl and me."

"Given my choices I'd say Daryl and you are my best options. I wasn't all that impressed with the student body, if we're being honest." To illustrate her point, she lifted her chin to gesture at the front where a boy she now knew as Byron was trying to sneak his hand up a girl's skirt and laughing when she swatted him away.

"You've got me there, I guess. I still don't get your thing about Daryl, though. You are like, so determined to get him to talk with you no matter how awkward he gets. Are you sweet on him? 'Cause lemme tell you, you'd have an easier time trying to get with Marlon Brando."

"Of course I'm not sweet on him. I just met him for goodness’ sake. But there's just something about him that makes me curious, you know? Not to mention he's the only one I saw all day that showed you an ounce of respect."

"I'm not saying he's not a good guy. I like him. I think he sits by me in class and at lunch because he knows people are less likely to bully me if he's around—everyone's kind of afraid of him."

"Why?"

"Whaddya mean why? You've seen him. He's built and always has a look on his face like he could take you down with a single swing. Not to mention his family's reputation."

"What reputation?"

Michonne chuckled and said, "I keep forgetting, you're the new kid in town. You don't know about the Dixon's. Everybody says they're bad news. Daryl's brother's this rough ex-marine who's been banned from at least three bars in the county for starting fights, and rumor has it he's on dope. Like, the hard stuff. The daddy, too."

"What about the mother?"

"Dead. Died in a house fire years ago. I wasn't in school with Daryl then, but news got around even to the colored school that Mrs. Dixon burnt herself up."

"Burnt _herself_ up?"

"There are about a million different versions of the story—she did it on purpose ‘cause her old man was beating on her, or he did it to her and tried to pass it off as an accident—small town gossip, you know? Gotta find entertainment somewhere. But the story the more level-headed people seem to agree on most is that she got drunk in bed with a lit cigarette. Just fell asleep and that was that."

"That's terrible," Carol said. She gazed out the window, the loss of her own mother fresh in her mind, and suddenly she felt close to Daryl, even though he wasn't there to know it.

"It was," Michonne agreed, tone softer. "I guess after that, Mr. Dixon went off the deep end. He can hardly hold down a job, and when he does get money he drinks it all. Daryl works for Mr. Horvath. He owns a construction company near the meat plant your daddy works at. Daryl helps with site cleanup and inventory, stuff like that. He's never said as much, but I bet most of his checks go to making sure he and his daddy don't end up on the street with a tin can begging for coin." 

"Is that why he hardly had any food at lunch?"

"Noticed that, huh? I've never asked, but I think his cabinets are pretty bare at home. Don't go bugging him about it, though. You think he's quiet now, but if you go prying he'll clam right up and stay that way forever."

"I would never. I know what it's like to have no money."

"Yeah, most of the kids at school know, too, but Daryl's the brokest one, and also the proudest. Be careful with him, okay? He doesn't make friends easy. Hell, I don't even know if _I'm_ his friend, and I've spent all three years of high school sitting next to him."

Carol nodded absently, turning back to the window where trees whipped by as the bus rattled around over any miniscule bump in the road. She had that feeling again, that feeling of wanting to be contrary. 

Daryl supposedly was a book closed so tight the pages might as well be glued together.

She decided right then and there that she was going to find a way to open it. 

And then she was going to read every word.

*

The breeze off the pond kept making Daryl shiver, despite the poncho he was wearing. It was his jeans that were the problem; they'd been patched and repatched so many times that they were nothing but rags by now, but he couldn't afford new ones, and his other, decent pair was reserved for school, although they were only slightly better off than the ones he was wearing.

He curled himself into a ball and gripped the rod of his fishing pole tighter. His gloves were too thin, and a hole was wearing on the left thumb, and that wasn't doing him any favors either.

It was early dawn and he could see his breath when he exhaled. He gave his pole a useless tug, as if trying to taunt the fish into biting, but he knew better. The likelihood that he'd be going home with any fish was low. It was the absolute worst season for fish, but with the game so scarce in the woods lately he was growing desperate. The day before he'd eaten a bowl of plain rice and a piece of what little was left of his venison jerky. If he didn't get something to tide him over until he had enough money to go to the store he'd have to ask Dale for another advance, and although he undoubtedly would without question, Daryl would never recover from the shame of it. He'd almost rather go hungry.

From behind him there was the unmistakable sound of a twig snapping under a human foot, and for a split second Daryl panicked, worried it was his father coming after him, even though he would have had no reason to have followed him into the woods. That was just Daryl's default fear whenever something caught him off guard. It only took him a second to remind himself of this, and he glanced over his shoulder, calmer now, to see who was approaching.

His momentary panic turned to annoyance when he saw who it was. Carol Mason. The whole week he'd been subjected to her constant attempts at being friendly, and now here she was in his private place he went to whenever he wanted solitude. Did she ever give up?

She was bundled up in a long, purple jacket that went down to her thighs and a matching scarf wrapped around her neck. She had her backpack slung over her shoulder, and when she noticed Daryl sitting by the pond her eyebrows flew to her hairline.

"Daryl?" she said, a smile spreading across her face.

"The hell are you doin' out here?" Daryl grunted, harsher than he intended. "You followin' me or somethin'? Constantly hangin' off my arm at school ain't enough or what?"

If Carol was offended she didn't show it. She made her way across the clearing until she was standing next to him at the edge of the pond, the tips of her boots sinking an inch into the wet mud. 

"I'm not following you," she said. "I found this place last week and I wanted to come back. It's peaceful out here. I had no idea you knew about it, too."

"Hmph," Daryl grumbled. He wanted to point out that he'd been coming to the clearing for years and that gave him dibs, but it felt silly to claim ownership over public property. Still, he couldn't help but feel as though she had stepped inside his house without knocking first. 

“You’re fishing?” she asked. He didn’t answer since he saw no point in stating the obvious. “Kinda late in the season for that, isn’t it? What type of lure are you using? You’re not using worms, are you?” She pointed at the mason jar of dirt Daryl had beside him on the ground.

“What’s it to you?” he asked, staring out at the still water where the only movement on his line was from the wind.

“If you use crankbait you might have better luck than with worms. How shallow is the water?” 

“I know how to fish just fine, thanks. I don’t need your help.”

“Why? ‘Cause I’m a girl? Do you think I’d be too worried about breaking a nail to be any good?”

“Didn’t say nothin’ ‘bout you bein’ a girl. I just don’t need no city folk comin’ out here actin’ like they know better.” 

“Well, for your information,” Carol said, putting a hand on her hip, affronted. “My daddy’s taken me out fishing every summer since I was old enough to hold a pole, and I’m telling you, you’re gonna catch jack-all if you don’t use a proper lure. Not in January.” 

The infuriating thing was that Daryl knew she was right, but he was a hunter, not a fisherman, and was working with minimal supplies. His hooks were rusty, and he had had to tie a rock to the line to make his own weight. 

“You come here to harass me or what?” he snapped. He looked at her, expecting for her to snap back, but instead she had a half-grin and a mischievous glint in her eye.

“No, I didn’t. I’m sorry.” She slid her backpack off her shoulder and let it drop onto the damp grass. She followed suit, lowering herself down, seemingly unconcerned that the seat of her pants were bound to get stained. 

“Make yourself at home, why dontcha,” Daryl grumbled.

“I will, thanks,” Carol said brightly. Daryl rolled his eyes as she started patting around her jacket, feeling the pockets, searching for something. 

“What’re you doin’?” he asked.

Instead of answering, Carol pulled her hand from her pocket and produced what was unmistakably a perfectly rolled joint. In spite of himself, Daryl’s irritation was overshadowed by surprise.

“You gonna smoke a spliff in the woods at six in the mornin’?” 

“You ever get high at sunrise?” she asked, criss-crossing her legs. “It’s my favorite time of day, early morning. Everything’s quiet and calm, and this just makes it better.”

Daryl said nothing; just watched as she located a lighter in a different pocket and lit the tip of the joint, sucking on it until the cherry turned red. She then blew out a cloud of odorous smoke and offered it to him.

Hesitating, Daryl decided, “why the hell not?” and took the joint from her. He took a drag and held the smoke in his lungs for a few seconds, his throat instantly burning and scratchy. He coughed on the exhale and felt stupid about it; about choking on pot in front of this girl, as if he had something to prove.

It didn’t matter, anyway. She didn’t seem concerned about how he handled his smoke. She took the joint back and held it between her index and middle fingers on one hand, letting it sit between the peace sign, and started digging in her backpack with the other.

“Hungry?” she asked when she produced something round wrapped in tinfoil. She didn’t wait for an answer. She peeled back the foil to reveal a loaf of homemade bread. She tore off a chunk and held it out to him. At the mere sight of it Daryl’s stomach growled—which, good god, did he hope she didn’t hear—but he didn’t take it right away. First, he searched her face for any sign of pity. She’d been spending a lot of time with Michonne, and Michonne knew him well enough to know he didn’t always have much to eat. It was possible she’d tell Carol, and he wasn’t about to accept charity.

But there was no pity in her eyes. If anything, she seemed indifferent, like it truly didn’t matter one way or the other. Like she was just being polite. Daryl could deal with that.

“Thanks,” he muttered. His instinct was to shove the whole piece into his mouth, but he forced himself to take smaller bites. He chewed with his mouth open and dropped crumbs down his front, but he didn’t care so much about being sloppy, just as long as he didn’t seem desperate. The crust of the bread was just the right amount of crunchy, and the inside was soft, and next to the cookies she shared with him and Michonne at lunch every day it was the best thing he’d tasted in a very long time.

“Alright?” she asked, tearing off a chunk for herself. She took another toke before biting into her piece.

“Yeah, ‘s’good. You make it?” He had another pull when she passed the joint his way.

“Mhm. My mom taught me how. There was no better baker in all of Atlanta than her.”

“She do it professionally?” 

“Now and then, yeah, when we needed extra cash. She’d take shifts at a nearby bakery, but she preferred to give it away for free. She doesn’t do that now, though. Doesn’t do anything, anymore. She died about six months ago.”

“Oh. Sorry.” 

Daryl busied himself by pinching his fishing line and seeing if there was any movement happening that he couldn’t see. There wasn’t.

“Can I ask you a question?” Carol said after the silence between them—which wasn’t as awkward as Daryl would have expected—had dragged on for a while. 

“What difference does it make if I say yes or no? You’ll ask either way. Spent the whole damn week playin’ twenty questions with me.”

He glanced at her when she laughed, and to his surprise he felt a smile tug at his own lips. 

“I guess that’s true,” she agreed. She tore him off another piece of bread, which he took without question this time, the weed slowing his thoughts down and denying him the time needed to overthink. 

“What’s your question?” he asked through a full mouth.

“Those drawings you’re always making—what are they for? You’re a good artist, but why houses? Do you wanna be an architect or something?”

Even through the haze of his high, Daryl had the sense to be embarrassed. 

“You asked me that already,” he said, ducking his head.

“And you didn’t answer it. It’s fine if they’re just for fun. Just seemed like a weird thing to draw over and over. Then again, I can’t draw for shit so maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about. Is that what artists do? Draw things a million times until they’re perfect at it?”

“Pfft, I ain’t an artist.” 

“You make a lot of art for someone who isn’t an artist. It’s all I ever see you do during lectures.”

“They’re nothin’,” he said shortly. “Just dumb doodles.” Carol’s gaze bore into his profile and his face grew hot despite the brisk breeze still making him shiver now and then.

After much too long—or maybe that was the pot, too—Carol finally said, “I don’t mean to pry. I just like watching you draw, and I like your drawings. You could totally design houses. Have you considered going to college for it?” 

At that Daryl had to bark a laugh.

“Right,” he said, giving her an incredulous look. “Me in college. Come on now, you might be new but you can’t be that ignorant. You know ‘bout my family by now, don’t pretend. Nah, if I make it to graduation next year it’ll be a miracle.” 

“Why wouldn’t you graduate? You’ve turned in all your assignments we’ve had, and I saw your mark on the math test. You got an A.”

“Are you a goddamn private eye or what? You really don’t know how to mind your business at all, do you?”

“No, I do. I just don’t,” Carol said with a shrug. It surprised a laugh out of him.

Sighing, he set his fishing pole off to the side, conceding defeat at last, and wrapped his arms around his freezing legs.

“Everyone knows what I’m gonna end up bein’,” he said, his breath a light fog in the morning air.

“I don’t. What are you gonna end up being?”

“A soldier.” Daryl picked at a fleck of mud on his knee. “Second I turn eighteen it’ll just be a matter of time ‘fore the draft board comes a’knockin’. Don’t see a whole lotta point in high school. The hell does an A on a math test matter if I’m goin’ to ‘Nam either way?”

“Graduation isn’t for another year. More than that, even. Maybe they won’t need anymore soldiers by then.”

“You really believe that?” When she didn’t answer he nodded. “Yeah. Me either. They always need more soldiers.” 

His words hung heavy around them, and they sat in it silently, passing the joint back and forth until there was nothing left but a nub. 

When the weed was gone and the sun had risen far above the horizon, Carol got to her feet and wiped the dirt off her jeans. She put on her backpack and gestured at the pond where Daryl’s line that he hadn’t bothered to reel in lay flat, motionless, and pathetic in the water.

“Crankbait,” she said. “Trust me.”

She then turned on her heel and headed back the way she came without so much as a goodbye, not that Daryl offered one either. No, instead he watched her disappear through the treeline, and continued to stare long after that. He had the distinct impression that he might have just had a genuinely nice time with another person, which he wasn’t sure had ever happened before, but he was too stoned to consider any of the implications.

He lay down on his back, his hands folded beneath his head. In his periphery he saw the sun glint off a piece of tinfoil, and when he looked he saw Carol had left the rest of the bread behind. Something in his gut told him it’d been on purpose; a silent gift because she knew he wouldn’t accept it any other way.

She’d played him, he realized, and yet all he felt was grateful. Not mad, embarrassed, or ashamed. Grateful.

It seemed that whatever change Carol had brought with her into his town was already taking root. And he had no choice but to wait and see how it would grow.


	2. 1966: A Collection of Smiles

Carol was lying on her back in the grass humming Four Tops, “Can’t Help Myself,” which Daryl knew by heart because the radio station they listened to at work played it a thousand times a day. He didn’t mind so much hearing it from her, though. She was always humming or singing something, but her voice was pleasant enough, and it made a nice background sound to whatever they were doing at the time.

What they were doing at that particular time was nothing. Daryl was on his back, too, and it was the third morning that the two of them found themselves in the forest clearing getting high and having a satisfying breakfast of whatever baked good Carol decided to bring.

This time it was monkey bread drenched in a heavenly homemade caramel sauce that Daryl had to keep licking off his fingers.

He wasn’t attempting to fish again. He’d gotten paid and was able to get a few bags of rice and dried beans, and on Wednesday he’d checked his traps and found a fat, fuzzy squirrel waiting for him, so he wasn’t feeling nearly as desperate. He was content to simply laze about in the early morning sunshine in Carol’s company, which was slowly starting to become more of a pleasure than a nuisance.

“I’ve got a job interview tomorrow,” Carol said into the quiet, like she’d only just remembered.

“Where at?” Daryl asked. He licked his lips a couple times, the inside of his mouth thick like it was full of cotton, but he wasn’t motivated enough to reach for his canteen. It was within arm’s reach, but it may as well have been in Antarctica for how heavy his limbs were, totally unwilling to pat the ground around him.

“The Meadowlark Diner. You heard of it? My daddy heard through the grapevine at work that they need a new waitress.”

Had he heard of it? He had more than heard of it. In fact, he probably knew every detail of the place down to the last floor tile. It was a dingy little joint right next to the garage where his brother worked. The customers were all burly bikers and greasy mechanics who tipped the waitresses by giving them slaps on their rear-ends. The food was all deep-fat fried, and every surface was coated in a thin layer of cooking oil. It wasn’t a place for a good girl to be spending her time.

"That joint ain't somewhere you wanna be."

"Why's that?"

"‘Cause you ain't the type that belongs in that part of town."

"Says who?"

"You ever been out there?"

"No."

"The town it’s in is where the lowest of the low out in the country go to get lit. There’s two bars, the diner, a garage, and a Methodist church ain't no one's been in for five years ‘cept to take working girls out back of."

"Sounds like it has character."

"Sure, that's one way to put it. Just trust me. It ain't the place for you."

Carol rolled over onto her stomach and looked at Daryl with droopy, bloodshot eyes.

"If the diner has a paycheck to give away then it's the place for me. What's it to you where I go to get work, anyways? You don't even like me.”

Daryl furrowed his brow, squinting at her, the sun in his eyes.

"I like you fine."

"Whenever I talk to you at school you look like you're chewing on a brick."

"That's just the way my face gets, l dunno. I ain't good at conversation, 's'all."

"You're doing fine with conversing right now,” Carol pointed out, sounding accusatory. Daryl snorted.

"Well, yeah, and I’m also stoned. Makes it easier."

Carol bit her bottom lip between her front teeth and searched Daryl's face.

"So you do like me, then?"

Daryl thought about it.

He'd be lying if he said her presence in his life hadn't shaken things up, and he still didn't have the first clue on how he was meant to interact with someone who was so damned determined to get to know him—no one knew him, not really, and he wasn't sure he wanted that to change—but he was getting used to her. Hell, sometimes it was fun to have her hanging around, like on Tuesday when she "accidentally” stuck her foot out and tripped some tool who was talking shit about Michonne and not even bothering to do it behind her back.

No, she wasn't turning out to be the pain he'd expected her to be. He meant what he said: He liked her fine.

He shrugged his assent and Carol hummed a noise of surprise.

"Well, here's a bigger question for you, then. You and me... are we friends?"

Now, that wasn't quite as simple.

"Don't really got friends,” he said, turning his gaze back up at the sky. "Never have."

"Is that by design?"

"Hm? How do you mean?"

"l mean, let's say, hypothetically, that someone wanted to be your friend. Would you let them? Or do you plan on going through your whole life alone?"

Daryl twisted his mouth, thinking. Above him a single fluffy cloud wandered lazily by. He didn't speak for a while—at least he didn't think he did; time wasn't exactly a concept he adhered to right then—but Carol didn't press him to answer.

"No one's ever asked me that before," he said eventually. "Guess it'd be alright having a friend, if I liked ‘em well enough and they didn't get on my nerves too much."

"Well, third question for you, then, and be prepared, it's a doozy—since you ‘like me fine' and everything, do you think we might be able to upgrade this relationship to honest-to-god friendship?"

Daryl tapped an arrhythmic beat against his belly with his fingertips.

"You'd still bake shit l could eat?"

Carol giggled, and Daryl smiled a little too, even though he hadn't really been joking.

"Definitely," she said. "In fact, l bake even more for my friends."

"Alright," Daryl agreed. "Then I s'pose we can be friends."

Carol re-lit their blunt.

"To celebrate," she explained through a mouthful of billowing smoke when she passed it to him.

It occurred to him mid-toke that he might end up feeling some type of way about all that when he sobered up, but then, that was later.

Instead he simply handed back the blunt and said, "Cheers."

*

Gravel kicked up underneath the tires of the old pickup truck as Carol made the turn-off down the country road that led to Michonne’s house. It’d taken a lot of persuading on her part to get her new friend to agree to a ride to school. 

“My daddy’s letting me borrow the truck for the day so I can go to my interview,” Carol had said. “Let me pick you up in the morning; save you a trip on that god awful bus.”

Despite having spent the past two weeks in Carol’s company, Michonne didn’t seem convinced that Carol’s motives were genuine. Carol couldn’t fault her, of course. She’d seen the way she was treated fristhand, and the things she went through on the daily would make anyone distrustful. But that merely strengthened Carol’s resolve to prove she was serious about their budding friendship, and with her trademark stubbornness she managed to wear Michonne down by simply not taking no for an answer.

Michonne was waiting for her when she came down the long, dirt drive. The roof of the house needed reshingled, and the siding looked like it had been worn down by the last couple of big storms that had blown up from the coast at the end of last summer, but it was bigger than Carol’s place. That wasn’t the most striking difference, however. The thing that hit Carol the second she laid eyes on Michonne’s house was how it seemed so much like a  _ home _ .

Despite it being mid-January, a huge, evergreen wreath with a red ribbon tied in a bow around it was hanging on the front door, and at the base of the modest patio there were matching woven baskets that had been transformed into planters that surely held vibrant flowers in the summer, but in the interim had sprigs of lipstick red holly blooming from the soil. A child’s bicycle was tipped over in the yard, as though it had been abandoned mid-ride, maybe during super call. 

Carol used to live in a home. Her mother had been able to take any space and claim it as her own with decorations, color, and an intangible warmth her father, bless him, simply didn’t know how to master. That first day without her mother—when Carol and her father had left the hospital, dazed and dissociated as the city moved around them in its usual morning bustle as if the world hadn’t irreparably changed forever—the house already seemed duller, as though her mother’s soul had been a part of the infrastructure and it was draining from the woodwork.

Carol fought down a pang of longing as she waited for Michonne to approach. From behind the screen door Carol saw whom she assumed was Michonne’s mother watching with an air of suspicion. She was a tall, slender woman with a small boy no older than the age of three hanging onto her apron. The woman didn’t pay him any attention, and instead kept her gaze fixed on Carol, her arms crossed.

Carol had a collection of smiles she used for any number of occasions, and very few of them were genuine. She had a smile she used to charm people, and one she used to get sympathy. She would sometimes pull out her “fuck you” smile, which was always fun. Since a very young age she had learned how to weaponize kindness. People responded to you if you were cheerful, so that’s how she performed, whether she truly felt it or not.

But one look at Michonne’s mother told Carol that no false smiles were going to placate her. She had the stern and tired expression of somebody who knew all the tricks to the trade of people; somebody who knew how to perform. There was no doubt that she could smell bullshit from a mile away.

So Carol didn’t wear a mask when she lifted a hand to wave at the woman. She didn’t try to reassure her that she “wasn’t like the others,” nor try to invalidate her fears. She simply waved, the corner of her lip quirked up in the smile she used the least—the real one.

After a beat, Michonne’s mother nodded, and then disappeared from view.

“How do you listen to that?” Michonne asked in lieu of a greeting when she opened the door and lifted herself up into the truck. It was only when it was pointed out that Carol realized her radio, which was turned nearly to the max volume, was more static than sound, like usual.

“It’s my favorite station,” she said with a shrug, as she backed out of Michonne’s drive.

“You can’t even tell what’s playing.”

“Sure you can.” Carol strained her ears for a moment. “It’s ‘My Girl’. You know, The Temptations song?” 

“I know the song, but usually it has words.”

“Oh please, you’re dramatic. But fine, see if you can find something better, then. There aren’t any good stations out here in the middle of nowhere.” 

“You learn to take what you can get, city girl.” Michonne started fiddling with the dial, getting static, more static, a gospel station they both vetoed, and more static, until finally landing on one where a tinny male’s voice managed to be audible through the dusty pickup speakers. 

“—and the final totals are saying that nearly two thousand United States’ soldiers were killed in action last year. Meanwhile, 40,000 young men will be receiving their draft notices by month’s end. How’s that for a late Christmas present? Protests against the war have been on the upclimb, causing unrest, especially among the younger population. Despite this, LBJ says to expect an increased need for recruits over the next—”

Michonne turned the dial back to the original station.

“I’d rather listen to static,” she said, expression sour.

The last few notes of “My Girl” faded out, getting lost in the white noise.

“Yeah,” Carol muttered. “Me, too.” 

*

The Meadowlark diner was every bit as charming as Daryl said it would be, which was to say that it was a pigsty. 

The place stank of burnt grease and the air was humid with the steam from the kitchen. The decor was unseemly, profane, and would make any good girl blush. There were signs cluttering the walls, covering any available space, with dumb slogans and phrases, like, “Be patient with the waitresses, even a toilet can serve only one a$$hole at a time!” and, “We don’t serve women, you gotta bring your own!” The pièce de résistance, however, was at the far back wall, right next to the wooden sign hanging from the ceiling with an arrow and “LATRINE” painted in bold, black letters. The entire thing was covered in a blown-up picture of Maryln Monroe’s  _ Playboy _ centerpiece, with holes cut out where her breasts should be and replaced with dartboards.

The customers fit the aesthetic, too. It wasn’t yet dinner rush by the time Carol arrived for her interview, but a handful of booths were filled anyway, all of them occupied by burly men, say for one woman who was seated next to a guy wearing a sleeveless flannel in January, and judging by the way she kept angling herself so that he could get a proper view of her cleavage, she was busy working a job of her own. It seemed a bit early in the day for such an activity to Carol, but then, who was she to judge? They were all just trying to make enough money to survive.

Carol loitered in the doorway for a moment, and as soon as she was noticed the handful of customers stared at her like she was a meal, and she couldn’t exactly blame them. It wasn’t hard to guess that the only women that frequented the diner were either employees, workers of a different trade, or the type that could go shot-for-shot with the men at the biker bar down the street, and here she was in a knee-length, plaid skirt, and her goddamn cardigan. 

Intimidated though she was, she didn’t dare let it show. She made her way from the door to the counter fully aware there were eyes on her, but she didn’t falter. She got to the counter and saddled in next to a sweaty man on a barstool who winked at her. Plucking from her collection, Carol put on a smile that oozed honey and sent it his way, before turning to grab the attention of the waitress at the register.

“Excuse me,” she said. “I’m supposed to meet up with someone named Andrea for a job interview?”

The woman at the register glanced at Carol with a mild expression, and then called over her shoulder and into the kitchen, “Andrea, your four o’clock is here.”

“Thanks, Lori,” a blonde woman wiping her hands on a dish towel said a moment later, as she emerged from swinging double doors. She looked at Carol and, without a word, gave her a good, long once over from head-to-toe. Carol stood still and waited patiently until Andrea was done assessing her.

“So.” Andrea snapped a piece of chewing gum and put her hands on her hips. “You ever waitress before?”

“Not exactly, but I helped out at a bakery sometimes back in Atlanta.”

“Bet you used to come home smellin’ like sugar every night,” the sweaty man beside her said helpfully, visibly sniffing the air between them.

“Aren’t you charming,” Carol said flatly, and then turned back to Andrea, who was watching the interaction like a hawk, likely trying to catch Carol acting affronted or bashful, but Carol knew already that acting coy wasn’t going to do her any favors in a place like this. 

“I think you should hire her, Andrea, we could use new eye candy around here,” the sweaty guy said. He put his hand on Carol’s lower back—her  _ lower _ lower back—and grinned, his yellow, chipped front teeth on display.

“That’s awful precarious placement of your hand right there, sweetie. Are you sure you wanna do that when you know I’ve got ready access to a knife?” She nodded at the gravy-and-crumb-stained knife sitting beside the sweaty guy’s plate of chicken fried steak. The sweaty guy followed her gaze and took a beat before snorting and dropping his hand.

“Never mind,” he told Andrea. “Another bird with a mouth on her is just what we  _ don’t _ need around here. Forget I said anything.”

Andrea smirked at Carol, and at the register Lori was muffling a giggle with the back of her hand pressed against her mouth.

Andrea said, “The hours are for evenings and weekends. You’d have to work until close at least one Saturday a month, no exceptions and no tryna pass it onto another waitress.”

“That’s fine.”

“Once I set the schedule for the week it’s not my problem if you suddenly can’t work. I don’t give a damn if it’s your nephew’s fifth birthday or if your grandma just died, either fill your shift or work it.”

“I can do that.”

“Don’t touch anyone else’s tips.”

“I would never.”

“How old are you?”

“Sixteen. Seventeen in a couple weeks.”

“If anyone asks, you’re eighteen. Come in tomorrow at four thirty for the dinner shift. We’ll get you your uniform then. And if you come in here on your days off I better see you in a shirt at least one size smaller and a skirt six inches shorter. Our customers have certain expectations, got it?”

“Got it.”

“Swell. See you tomorrow. Don’t be late.”

With that, Andrea turned on her heel and headed back into the kitchen. Lori gave Carol a quick congratulatory nod before going back to counting coins. The sweaty guy on the barstool leaned in close enough that Carol could smell ketchup and beer on his breath.

“Can’t wait to see you in that lil’ waitress uniform, Red. I’ll make sure I have a front row seat.”

Carol smiled a real smile, not at him of course, but from a sense of accomplishment.

She wore it on her face all the way to the truck, and some time after that.

*

If you asked him why he’d have no idea how to explain it, but from Tuesday morning when Carol had excitedly told him she’d gotten the job at The Meadowlark, to that Friday afternoon after the final bell rang and he sat on his motorcycle, an unlit cigarette dangling between his teeth as he watched her wave goodbye to Michonne and make her way to her father’s shitty pickup truck, Daryl had been worried about her.

It wasn’t totally unreasonable, he told himself when he started to feel foolish staring at her driving off to the diner. He knew what kind of place The Meadowlark was, and more than that, he knew what kind of people the clientele were. Hell, he was related to one of the regulars, and if that didn’t give him expertise on the matter he didn’t know what would. Damn it, he wished she’d listened to him when he said she didn’t belong there. He’d known her barely three weeks, but that was more time than he needed to know that she had an insufferable stubbornness about her that made her do the exact opposite of what she’d been told to do, whether that meant getting a job being ogled by shitty men, or befriending the school’s two biggest social outcasts. 

But that was just it—she was his friend. They’d all but spit-and-shook on it. And weren’t friends supposed to worry and take care of each other? Sure, he didn’t have a lot of experience in the field, but he felt that it was a safe assumption to make.

That was his justification when he knocked his heel back on the kickstand of his bike and took off behind her.

The town where the diner was located could hardly be classified as such. It didn’t show up on any maps as anything other than a dot next to “country road 124,” and last he heard the total population was fourteen. The town wasn’t a place people came to live—it was a junction nearly everybody had to drive through to get to the city, and a few entrepreneuring young men took this opportunity to get a couple liquor licences and building permits, and now it functioned as one trashed square mile of land where the police were paid off to let people come and get drunk and high and fucked. And get their oil changed in the process.

Of the fourteen residents located there, Daryl’s brother, Merle, was one of them, living in what could almost pass as a habitable apartment above his garage. 

Daryl had never been that close to his brother. With over a decade and a half between them, Merle had been a marine on the frontlines in Korea when Daryl was only three years old, and when he was discharged he might as well have still been in another country for how much he came around. Growing up, Merle had been more of a concept; a name that got thrown around every now and then whenever he did something that warranted being talked about. Their mother missed him—would say so on the nights she got to the bottom of her wine bottle—and Merle repaid her by being locked up and unable to get furlough to attend her funeral.

This was all to say that Daryl held no great fondness for his brother, and  _ did _ hold quite a bit of resentment. 

But over the past couple years Merle had been on a kick where he kept trying to make amends. He had started his garage with a buddy, hadn’t been in the slammer for ages, and he kept his hard drug use for the weekends, mostly, and he’d offered to let Daryl come live with him until the army inevitably took him. Given that Merle’s apartment had only one bedroom, smelled like mildew and stale smoke, and had a million cigarette burns in the couch upholstery and carpet, it hadn’t been a very tempting offer. Home was a nightmare, but at least he had the woods to escape into. 

No, Daryl only came to stay with Merle when their dad was on a particularly bad bender and gained a personal vendetta for god-knows-why against Daryl, and decided he didn’t want his youngest son to know anything but the sting of his belt on his back and his wet breath when he was screaming in his ear.

Which is why, when Daryl parked his bike outside the open garage doors, Merle stood up from the hood of the car he was bent over and immediately asked, “Shit, what’d the fucker do this time?”

“Nothin’, just had some pocket change for once and was cravin’ a burger,” Daryl said nonchalantly. 

The garage and the diner were separated only by a thin, gravel alleyway, and the windows to the diner were big and untinted, making it easy for Daryl to peer inside. From where he stood he could see Carol standing beside a booth holding a tiny notepad and pencil and talking to a man whose face Daryl couldn’t make out. Merle came up beside him and followed his gaze.

“A burger, huh?” Merle said, a shit-eating grin spreading across his face. “You sure that’s all you’re cravin’?”

Daryl quickly looked away from the window and feigned ignorance. 

“The fuck are you talkin’ about?”

“Did you hear about the new piece of ass they hired? That why you come down here? Wanted to see it for yourself? Can’t say I blame you, baby brother, she’s worth the drive. The way her backside fills out them lil’ skirts they wear is just…” Merle pressed his fingers to his lips and kissed them with a loud smacking noise. Daryl was quickly remembering why he didn’t make it a habit of visiting his brother.

“You’re a pig, man,” Daryl said. He started to walk away when Merle fell in step beside him, making him stop in his tracks. “What’re you doin’?”

“Joinin’ you. I could use a ‘burger’ myself,” Merle said, doing air quotes with a smirk.

“I don’t need company. I got homework.”

“Aw, Darylina has to make sure he gets his book report done in time. How precious. C’mon, man.” Merle bumped Daryl’s shoulder with his own. “I’m buyin’. You’re gettin’ scrawny. When was the last time you ate a full meal?”

“I told you I got money.”

“Save it. I’ve had good business this month. Let’s go.” 

Merle started towards the diner, and Daryl hesitated for a minute before deciding he had no choice but to follow.

"Oh what do we have here? Has the King of Scum decided to grace us with his presence?" Andrea said from behind the register the instant Merle and Daryl entered the diner.

"Pretend all you want, babe, we both know you spend your time in here just hopin' to get a glimpse of this beautiful face," Merle shot back with a wink. Andrea smirked.

"You brought company today, I see. How've you been, Daryl?"

"Fine," Daryl mumbled. He showed himself to a booth, and Merle joined him.

"Carol, customers!" Andrea shouted towards the kitchen. 

A second later, Carol pushed through the double doors carrying a tray of club sandwiches and fries, looking harried. 

"On it," she told Andrea, sounding out of breath. She glanced over to the booth Daryl and his brother were occupying and instantly her entire demeanor changed.

"Daryl!" she called out with a glowing grin. "I didn't expect to see you here. Give me a moment and I'll be right with you, okay?"

Daryl nodded at her, and then, trying desperately not to blush, avoided looking at Merle, knowing he was staring him down and was about to have a lot to say. He picked up a sugar packet and began folding and unfolding the corner.

"Baby brother," Merle said. 

"Hm?" Daryl kept his eyes trained on the table.

"That pretty lil' thing over there knows your name. There somethin' you wanna tell me?"

"Not especially."

Merle certainly would have said more, but Carol chose that moment to arrive at their table. She set a couple laminated, single-paged menus down in front of the two of them, and then beamed at Daryl as if he was something worth being excited to see.

"Why didn't you tell me you'd be stopping by," she admonished, smacking him lightly on the arm. Daryl could practically feel Merle getting close to bursting.

"Was just on a whim," Daryl said with a shrug. The sugar packet was getting more and more crumpled by the second in his hands. "Forgot you was even workin' tonight."

"Then why'd you tell me goodbye today by saying, 'Be careful at the diner tonight?'" 

Daryl blanched. Merle snorted.

"Hey there, sugar, me and you haven't been properly introduced," Merle said then. "I'm Merle. I'm this fool's older, and more handsome brother." He held out a hand, which Carol took enthusiastically.

"Oh! You're Daryl's brother! Nice to meet you. My name's Carol. I'm a friend of Daryl's. We go to school together."

"Is that so?"

"Yup. Here, lemme go get you guys some waters. Y'all want anything else to drink?"

"A Coke for me, doll."

"Got it. And you, Daryl?"

"Water's fine," he muttered, the flimsy, pink paper of the sugar packet ripping and dropping a few sugar crystals onto the table.

"Coming right up. Oh, and Daryl?"

"Hm?"

"Don't listen to what your brother says. You're plenty handsome, I promise." She all but skipped away to the kitchens, and Daryl tried his best to astral project himself out of his body and into the sun.

Merle let out a low whistle.

"Don't," Daryl said.

"I didn't say nothin'."

"But you was thinkin' a lot of somethin's. She's a friend, that's all."

"Hey man." Merle held his hands up in mock surrender. "More power to you, 'cause lemme tell you, if I had a girl like  _ that _ gettin' all cute and giggly with me, I wouldn't waste a second before takin' her back behind the—"

"Thanks for the drinks," Daryl said loudly, as Carol returned. She let out a short, bemused laugh at his aggressive gratitude, but didn't say anything about it.

"You're welcome. Now what'll you two be having?"

“Well, I know what I  _ want _ to be havin’, though I doubt it’s on the menu,” Merle said, resting his chin on one hand and grinning lazily at Carol.

“Burger,” Daryl said sharply. “He wants a burger. Me, too.”

Carol regarded Daryl for a moment, looking like she was biting back a laugh, which helped exactly nothing.

“We got a special today,” she said. “Double patty with the works and fries, only .85 cents.” 

“Fine,” Daryl said.

“I’ll take any special you got, honey,” Merle said. Daryl buried his face in his hands and stayed that way until Carol had long since retreated back into the kitchen. Only when he was  _ absolutely _ sure she was gone did he lift his head and glare at his brother.

“Why do you always gotta be such a prick?” he hissed, mindful of Andrea taking an order at the counter only a few feet away.

“Hey, if I’m encroaching on your territory, baby brother, just say so. But I’m tellin’ you now, if you don’t shoot your shot there’ll be at least a hundred guys who come and go through here that will.” 

“For fuck’s sake, I told you it ain’t like that.”

“No?” Merle raised an eyebrow as he took a long drink from his Coke.

“No,” Daryl said firmly.

“I see. If that’s the case then why is it you drove yourself all the way out here? You really expect me to believe you wasted all that gas for a burger?” 

Daryl glowered, wiping melted grains of sugar off his sweaty hands with a thin, paper napkin.

“I came here ‘cause I don’t like the idea of her bein’ here on a Friday night with guys like you hangin’ around like fuckin’ vultures.”

“Guys like  _ me _ ? Baby brother, I’m offended. I’ve always been a perfect gentleman.”

“Pfft,” Daryl snorted. “The only women that’s ever called you a gentleman are the ones you paid to say it.”

Merle put a hand to his heart and feigned offense.

“Words hurt,” he said solemnly.

“Good.”

“Look,” Merle said more seriously, dropping his arm and resting his elbows on the table. “You know I’m all talk. I ain’t gonna try nothin’ with a girl who isn’t jivin’ with it. ‘Sides, she’s a damn kid. You know I prefer to keep company with girls who know what they’re doin’. A lil’ maturity in the bedroom makes a big difference, just sayin’.”

“Wish you wouldn’t. And you might not try nothin’, maybe, but not everybody that rolls through here’s gonna be quite so considerate.” 

Merle shrugged, conceding the point, and then gave his brother a strange look.

“What?” Daryl asked, furrowing his brow.

“Nothin’. I’m just tryna figure out why you care so damn much. I mean, if you ain't sweet on this girl then what’s it to you what she does?”

Daryl didn’t mention that he’d been wondering the exact same thing. For all intents and purposes it shouldn’t matter to him one way or another if Carol wanted to get all tied up on the wrong side of the tracks. But whenever he tried not to care he remembered their early morning toke sessions in the clearing by the pond, and how every single time she had found a way to give him the leftovers of breakfast without once making him feel pitied.

“She’s just a real nice girl, is all,” he found himself saying. He used his straw to push ice cubes down in his glass of water. “And I think she thinks she knows somethin’ about somethin’ ‘cause she’s from the city, but she don’t know everythin’ she thinks she does, and she don’t know who she can trust and who she can’t out here, and I don’t want her to end up in a bad situation when I coulda stopped it.”

Merle scratched the stubble on his cheek, looking contemplative, and perhaps a little surprised at his brother’s honesty.

“Tell you what,” he said, “I’ll keep an eye on her when I can; make sure no one’s givin’ her too much grief. Andrea and the other girls will be watchin’, too. You know how they all ban together like a flock of damn geese, and she’s their new baby. Nobody’s gonna risk their rath, ‘specially not Blondie’s.”

“I’d appreciate it,” Daryl said, relieved. Maybe ending up at the diner with Merle hadn’t been the worst thing to happen.

“And you know what else?” Merle said then, snapping his fingers, startling Daryl. “I got a great idea.”

Daryl tensed. His brother’s “great” ideas were usually anything but.

“What is it?” he asked warily. 

“Tomorrow me and the guys from the garage are havin’ a shindig with the biker dudes down at Sara’s Roadhouse. There’ll be other girls there, and I was gonna see if Andrea wanted to come.”

“What? No. That’s a terrible idea.”

“Says who? It’ll be great. Anyone who makes a habit of comin’ down here will be there, and she can see ‘em in their natural habitat and get a feel for who’s worth a damn and who’s not. Hell, why don’t you come? You can put all the booze on my tab, plus maybe your girl will get her girlfriends to help her play dress up. Sweet on her or not, even you can’t deny that she’d clean up real nice.”

Daryl opened his mouth to explain just how much he’d rather have a lobotomy performed on him with an icepick than spend his Saturday night with a horde of his brother’s drunk friends, but he was cut off by Carol’s return.

“Here you go,” she said cheerfully, the art of balancing a tray while setting plates down on the table already mastered. Matching burgers with baskets of steak fries were placed before the two men. Carol then set a large, chocolate milkshake down directly in front of Daryl.

“Don’t tell Andrea,” she said to him in a stage whisper, “but it’s on the house. Figured you might need a bit of chocolate to help you put up with him.” She nodded at Merle, who burst out laughing. If he wasn’t mortified, Daryl might have laughed, too. As it was, he was already preparing on how he was going to get Merle to shut up about that one once she left.

“I like you,” Merle said, still chuckling. “Daryl here, he’s worried the folks around here are gonna give you trouble, but seems to me that maybe you’re a bit of a troublemaker yourself.”

“Is that why you’re here, Daryl?” Carol asked, raising an eyebrow. “You’re still worried that I can’t take care of myself? I told you I’d be fine.”

“Nah, he came out here so I could take a look at his bike,” Merle said easily, before Daryl had a chance to fumble with an answer. “He’s just always fussin’ about somethin’, and doesn’t think anyone in this neck of the woods has anythin’ good to offer, and I s’pose he’s right, but only to a point. They ain’t all bad. In fact, I was just tellin’ him that tomorrow night we’re havin’ a get-together at Sara’s Roadhouse—that bar down the street, you seen it?—and was thinkin’ you might wanna join us. Get to know the folks in the neighborhood.”

“A party?” Carol seemed tentative, which gave Daryl a glimmer of hope.

“What? You worried mommy and daddy won’t let you go?” Merle asked. Carol frowned.

“I can do what I want, that’s not a problem.”

“Well then, why don’t you come on by?” Merle grinned, and Carol looked at Daryl.

“Are you gonna be there?”

“Uh—” Daryl started.

“I was tryna convince him. I keep tellin’ him he needs to have fun now and then. The kid does nothin’ but go to school and work. You’d think he was fifty years old instead of sixteen. But I bet if you showed your pretty face there he’d have no choice but to join us.” 

Carol bit her lower lip, drumming her fingers against the tray she was now holding sideways under her arm.

“Dixon, are you harassing my waitresses again?” Andrea said then, coming up beside Carol, her hands on her hips. She glanced at Daryl apologetically and added, “Sorry, I meant the older Dixon. The menace.” 

“I was just givin’ your new girl a chance to get to know all the regulars. Tomorrow at Sara’s Roadhouse. The invitation’s extended to you, of course, and anyone you want to bring along. In fact, bring a gentleman friend with you. I wanna see which one of us you end up with at the end of the night.”

“In your dreams, Dixon.”

“Every single night, Blondie,” Merle said with a wicked grin. “So you comin’?”

“Maybe,” Andrea said with a shrug. “But stop tryna rope my girls into your nasty shenanigans.” Andrea turned to Carol. “Lori went to one party a year and a half ago and was scandalized.”

“Well, that’s Lori. Who says I would be?” 

Andrea smiled at Carol like she found her cute and endearing, and Daryl’s heart sank.

“Honey, you can hold your own with the boys in the diner, I’ll give you that, but a party at Sara’s Roadhouse? That’s like going from playing with a couple kittens and then thinking that means you can handle walking right into the lion’s den.”

Daryl saw Carol’s expression change, although he doubted anyone else did—it was subtle, but he knew exactly what it meant. Somebody had just told her she shouldn’t,  _ couldn’t _ , do something, and now, because for whatever damnable reason she simply couldn’t stand it, she was going to be contrary.

“What time tomorrow?” she asked Merle. Grinning, Merle looked at Daryl.

“That mean you’re comin’, too?” 

Daryl huffed an enormous sigh and began squirting ketchup over his pile of fries, letting his silence speak for itself.

He amended a previous thought: Ending up at the diner with Merle had definitely been a giant mistake.

*

Carol got home a little after eight, finding the house dark, her father's snores coming from his bedroom punctuated with occasional coughs from deep in his chest. She hung up her jacket and was about to go get changed, but she paused and glanced at the rotary phone sitting beside the armchair in the living room.

Worrying her lower lip between her teeth, she made a split second decision and plopped down on the old chair, its joints creaking under her weight. She paid it no mind as she lifted the receiver and squinted into the middle distance, trying to recall the number she wanted.

She remembered after a moment, and hoped she had it in the right order as she dialed.

"Hello?" a tired sounding woman answered after the third ring.

"Yes, hello, is Michonne there?" Carol asked. She felt nervous, as though she were doing something forbidden instead of simply calling a friend. The long pause Michonne's mother took on the other end didn't help matters.

Finally, she said, "Hold on a moment," and through the receiver Carol heard the muffled sounds of her friend getting called to the phone.

"Hello?" Michonne's voice said soon after, and Carol wasn't entirely sure what to say. She'd never done this before—called up a girl friend to gossip. She wasn't sure of the etiquette.

She decided to just go with her gut.

"Merle Dixon asked me to go to a party tomorrow night," she said without preamble. Michonne's pause was longer than her mother's.

"Carol?" she said finally.

"Obviously."

"Did you call just to tell me that?"

"Well, who else was I gonna tell? I need advice, and besides Daryl you're my only friend."

"...Alright. Tell me what happened."

Carol explained how Daryl and his brother had come into the diner, and how it had somehow led to her accepting an invite to a party that she was likely several years' too young for, and several more life experiences behind for.

"Are you actually gonna go?"

"It's not like I can back out now. Especially since Daryl is only going because of me, and his brother made it sound like he never does anything fun. If I don't go then  _ he _ might not go, and I don't want to take that from him."

"Knowing Daryl he'd probably consider it a blessing if you stood him up."

"It's not a  _ date _ , Michonne. He's just gonna be a familiar face around all the new people, that's all."

"Sure, but what are you gonna tell your dad? How are you gonna explain taking his truck and being gone until god-knows-when in the morning?"

"I'm not taking the truck, Daryl's gonna pick me up at the bus stop on his motorcycle."

"... He's doing what?"

"Yeah, I was surprised. His brother offered to give me a ride, but I don't think Daryl trusts him much, because he interrupted and said that if I insisted on going then he'd at least give me a ride. I'm kind of nervous, though, I've never ridden on a motorcycle before."

"And I doubt Daryl's ever given a girl a ride on one before. That still doesn't answer what you're gonna tell your dad."

"Not sure. Either I'll tell him I'm going to a friend's, or I'll sneak out. He works so much that I doubt he'd even notice. I'm not too worried about it."

"I can't believe you're really gonna go hang out with Merle Dixon and his whole crew. You'd better be careful."

"Do you want to come? Merle made it sound like it was a 'the more the merrier' sort of thing."

Michonne laughed.

"Yeah right, like I'm risking my life for a party by being the only colored person with a bunch of rednecks. Thanks, but I know what some of those guys are about. One too many drinks and suddenly I'll be the strange fruit growing on the poplar tree out front."

"They're not...I mean, they aren't the kinds of people that would be  _ that _ cruel, are they?" The twinge in Carol's gut that was questioning her decision to attend the party grew stronger.

"I think a lot more people than you think would be that cruel, city girl, but that's okay, I'm used to it. Besides, that doesn't mean I don't want all the details as soon as possible. I've heard rumors about how wild those parties can get, but never from a quality source."

"I'll tell you everything. But oh god, what am I gonna wear? I doubt this is the type of party I should wear a tea dress to, huh?"

"Definitely not. Look, I have to go, but do you want to maybe...I mean, if you want you could come over tomorrow. Like, during the day? I might have some clothes you could borrow."

Michonne sounded uncharacteristically shy, but Carol was beaming all alone in her dark living room.

"Absolutely. Just give me a time and I'm there."

*

Carol fell in love with Michonne's house the second she stepped over the threshold.

As homey as the outside seemed, the inside was tenfold. What the place lacked in square footage it made up for in warmth and personality. There were vibrant paintings hung on the walls—some of them professional, but others were clearly done by children, and Carol suspected that they were pieces of artwork Michonne's parents had collected from their children over the years, that they then treated with the respect one would give a genuine Goya or Van Gogh.

There were also sculptures. Weird sculptures, many that looked like they'd been plucked up from yard sales or thrift shops. Among the artwork there were the normal signs of family life, like toys scattered around, and a novel lying on the coffee table with a bookmark tucked inside a quarter of the way through. 

Nothing felt untidy, so much as it felt lived in; like no one went to the trouble to hide the fact that people resided there, like so many others tried to do, and Carol was enamoured. She loved the unabashed, unapologetic energy, and at the same time longed to have the same thing for herself.

Michonne seemed nervous, which threw Carol for a loop, because at school her friend always carried herself with a cool indifference which she had likely had to learn over the years in order to cope. But this wasn't school. This was her turf, where she was allowed to show how she felt, and Carol realized then that this was something new for both of them. Carol didn't know if it was because she was white, or because she'd never had many friends regardless of color, but it didn't matter, because at the end of the day all it meant was that they were at the same starting place, and that was a comfort.

She pulled a smile from her collection; a smile of reassurance, and Michonne loosened up a bit at the sight.

"C’mere, I’ll show you my room and we can try and find you an outfit.”

“Michonne’s bedroom was equally as chaotic as the rest of the house, only there was more of  _ her _ between the walls. There was still artwork, but among it there were posters of civil rights leaders captured mid-speech and protest. She had cut out newspaper articles and had plastered them around the room. Gazing at them, Carol saw headlines that said things like, “250,000 attend protest on Washington Mall,” and there were two taped side-by-side, one reading, “President Kennedy assassinated in Dallas, Texas,” in bold, black letters, and the other stating, “Malcolm X confirmed dead by gunshot at Audubon Ballroom,” in a matching font.

Michonne was watching Carol carefully, like she was waiting for a reaction; like she was worried that the discovery of her more radical side would be the thing that finally drove Carol away, and Carol had no idea what to say to convince her that their friendship wasn’t nearly that tenuous, so she let her actions do it for her.

“Did you paint this?” she asked. She pointed at a canvas that was on the ground, leaning against the wall, a brightly colored, geometric cat displayed with acrylic paint.

“Yeah. I haven’t finished it yet. My second youngest brother, Marcus, he got into my room and smudged it while it was still wet, see?” She indicated to the corner that had the tell-tale signs of someone small trying to turn it into a finger painting.

“I like it. It’s very, I dunno, Picasso.”

“Do you actually think that, or is that just the only artist you can think of off the top of your head?” Michonne asked, biting back a grin.

“I don’t see why it can’t be both,” Carol said with faux indignance, making Michonne laugh.

“Thanks.”

“I didn’t realize you painted. Between you and Daryl I’m the odd one out. I can barely draw a stick figure.”

“You can sing pretty alright.”

“Just because I can carry a tune doesn’t mean I’m an artist.”

“I guess, but it’s not nothing. Daryl wouldn’t call himself an artist either.”

“That’s because he’s stubborn, but you’ve seen his drawings. He’s so talented.”

Michonne narrowed her eyes.

“Are you like, totally sure you’re not sweet on him?”

“Oh my god, for the last time,  _ yes _ . Are  _ you _ sweet on him? Is that why you keep asking?”

“Pfft, no,” Michonne said firmly. “Don’t get me wrong, Daryl’s a swell guy, but he’s not my type.”

The feeling was so fleeting it was possible she imagined it, and she’d never admit to it even if she hadn’t, but for a moment Carol swore she felt relieved.

“Well, there you go. He’s just a friend, to  _ both _ of us.”

“Mm,” Michonne said, not sounding particularly convinced, but she dropped the subject. Instead, she went over to her closet and started rifling through her clothes. After a minute she pulled out a straight, light pink, shoulderless dress with a white collar.

“Here, try this one,” she said, handing it to Carol. “My momma sewed it for me but never lets me wear it ‘cause she accidentally hemmed it too short. I’m taller than you, so it should be perfect for what you need. Not too long to be prudish, but still leaving something to the imagination.”

Michonne shut the door while Carol undressed to her bra and panties. She pulled the dress over her head. It fell to her mid-thigh—the upper part of her mid-thigh—and she felt like she wasn’t leaving all that much to the imagination at all, actually, but Michonne clapped her hands and beamed in approval. 

“You look real fine, city girl.”

“Are you sure?” Carol asked doubtfully. She tugged down on the bottom of the dress, but Michonne swatted her hands away.

“Yes, trust me, that outfit is choice, and once I help you accessorize you’ll be turning  _ all _ the heads at that dumb dive bar.”

“I don’t need to turn  _ all _ the heads. I just need to convince them that I belong there, y’know? Everyone acts like I’m too innocent to really fit in.”

“Well, if you play your cards right, after tonight no one will think that anymore,” Michonne said, nudging Carol to lift her arms so she could wrap a black belt with a huge, square buckle around her waist.

“But I don’t want them to think I’m easy, either. How do I make everyone think that I’m fun, but not, you know,  _ that _ fun?”

“I think you just have to act real classy. Like, you  _ could _ open your legs for anyone you wanted, but you’re not  _ going _ to. Not because you’re a prude, but because you’re above it.”

“Alright,” Carol said, nodding thoughtfully. “I can do that.”

“I think being there with Daryl will help, too, since he’s Merle’s brother. You’ll be cool by association.”

“Helps to have an advantage, I suppose.”

Michonne was clasping a bracelet around Carol’s wrist when a knock came at the door.

“Yeah?” Michonne called out. The door opened and in walked the severe-looking woman Carol had seen from the doorway the day of her interview. She was holding a small boy who could have only been one at most.

“Have you seen Malcolm’s blanket? I need to put him down for a nap,” she asked Michonne.

“No. Ask Douglas. He and Marcus were making a fort in their room earlier.”

Michonne’s mother nodded absently, and then let her gaze fall on Carol, who tried not to blush under the scrutiny. She resisted the urge to pull her dress down.

“What’s going on in here?” Michonne’s mother asked after a long silence.

“Carol has a dinner party to go to later and needed fashion advice,” Michonne said without skipping a beat. 

“Michonne’s got a much better eye than me,” Carol confirmed, hoping she didn’t sound as anxious and desperate as she felt. “I love your home, by the way, ma’am. I wish my house was half as cool as yours.”

Michonne’s mother pursed her lips and regarded Carol with an unreadable expression.

“You said you’re going to a party?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Michonne’s mother tsked her tongue.

“Gimme fifteen minutes to get the baby down, and then bring her into the living room,” she told her daughter.

“What for?” Carol asked. Michonne’s mother cracked the absolute smallest of smiles. 

“Child,” she said seriously. “What you’re wearin’ don’t matter one bit—even if my daughter was able to get her hands on Jackie O’s dresses—if no one teaches you how to do your damn hair.”

And with that she showed herself out of Michonne’s room without another word.

“Hey,” Michonne said brightly, holding up two different pairs of earrings up to Carol’s face to compare them. “I think she likes you.”

*

When Daryl pulled up to the bus stop with the street sign standing at a 90 degree angle, he found Carol in a long overcoat, holding a compact mirror and trying to apply lipstick in the fading evening light.

“Sorry, just a moment, I couldn’t do this at home or my daddy would have noticed,” she said over the thrum of the motor. She smacked her lips a few times and, evidently satisfied, slid the mirror into her pocket. She then unbuttoned her coat and opened it, unveiling her outfit.

She asked, “Whaddya think?”

Daryl didn’t make a habit of paying any mind to how people dressed. Clothes were clothes, and he could barely put more than the bare minimum in his own day-to-day appearance—why on Earth would he put in any effort into others’?

But right then Carol was asking him explicitly to pay attention, and so for a moment, he did.

He looked her up and down, seeing how the dress she was wearing rested higher on her thigh than was her usual, and how she had on tall, black socks that went to her knees, paired with white boots with a bit of a heel. The most notable thing, however, was her hair. Where she usually had it crammed into an unruly bun, she instead had it styled in an up-do, pushed back with a polka-dotted headband, her curls silky and tamed.

Taking her in, Daryl realized for the first time that she was, in fact, a very pretty girl.

“Dunno. Look fine,” he said. He added a nonchalant shrug for flair. He couldn’t meet her eye, though, and he worried it might give him away; might clue her in that he did have an actual opinion on her appearance, and that it was a good one.

He then felt foolish. God forbid she find out that he thought something nice about her. Girls liked being complimented, right? Just because he was socially inept didn’t mean he had to be an ass.

He searched for something kind to add.

“Pink suits you,” he said finally, the time between his first statement and his second a little too long, but the smile that bloomed on Carol’s face was worth it. She grinned ear-to-ear with her freshly lipsticked lips, like she felt pretty, and he was the one who caused it.

It felt good, in a weird sort of way, to be able to get someone to smile like that. He’d never done it before.

“C’mon,” he grunted. He didn’t want to dwell on it. That would only lead to overthinking, and then he would get extra antisocial, and he was already having to use all his strength of will to convince himself to go to the damn party in the first place. He could sort his feelings on the matter out in his own time.

With some fumbling, Carol climbed onto the bike behind him. Her dress wasn’t elastic, making it ride up even higher, and when she slid her pelvis forward and wrapped her arms around his waist he was cocooned on either side by her smooth thighs, bare say for the thin layer of her nude-colored pantyhoes. 

He didn’t let himself think about it, pushing that to the wayside as well, and instead simply hit the gas and sped off, Carol’s fingertips digging into him as he went. 

*

It was nightfall by the time they pulled up to Sara’s Roadhouse, and the party, unfortunately, was already in full-swing.

There was a line of bikes out front, and a handful of rough, burly guys were standing near the curb, smoking and laughing loudly together. The door to the bar was propped open with a stone, and inside was packed with people Daryl recognized, and several more he didn’t. That tended to be the way these parties worked—there were the regulars, and then there were the regulars’ friends, and these were the ones Daryl was most suspicious of. He knew what brand of asshole the familiar faces were, but anyone new could, and usually would, introduce a whole other brand of chaos, which almost always culminated in at least one fist fight before the night was over.

God he hated parties.

He watched Carol swing herself off of his bike, tugging on the hem of her dress to hide her rear-end, and he swallowed down his resentment. No one forced him to be there. He was the one who insisted on babysitting.

That being said, as they started inside, Carol clung close to Daryl’s side, making him think that it was possible she appreciated his presence more than she let on, which he was surprised to find he was pleased by. If he had to be there at least he was serving a purpose.

At the doorway, a drunk man with an unkempt beard that Daryl didn’t know looked at Carol, whose coat was still hanging open, revealing her dress, and he did three things in quick succession: He winked, spit thick, phlegmy, black saliva from his chewing tobacco onto the concrete, and then made a kissy face at her.

“Not too late to go back home,” Daryl whispered in her ear, putting a hand on her shoulder and guiding her away from the man, but Carol only laughed.

It took Merle all of five seconds to zoom in on them. From smack dab in the middle of a bunch of people crowded around the bar, Merle raised his bottle of beer high over his head and called out, “Baby brother! Red! C’mon over here and say hello proper!”

Carol looked at Daryl expectantly. With him heaving a sigh, the two of them made the rest of the trek into the lion’s den. 

“Sugar, take that coat off, it gets hot in here,” Merle said when they reached him. A couple of the men in the small crowd made noises of approval. Hesitating only a moment, Carol slipped her coat off her shoulders, and was met with a chorus of whistles. Her arms twitched like she was about to cross them over her chest, but they remained down at her sides, her coat bunched up in her fist, brushing the floor.

“Boy, don’t just stand there like an invalid. Be a gentleman and take the girl’s coat,” Merle barked at Daryl.

“Oh,” Daryl muttered, caught off guard. He made to take Carol’s coat from her, but before he had a chance, Merle huffed and snatched it from her.

“Don’t know who taught this kid manners,” he grumbled. He lifted it over the counter and shoved it at the bartender, saying, “You keep an eye on this, you hear?”

Carol glanced at Daryl, who could do nothing but shrug and mime chugging from a glass, trying to imply that his brother had likely been going at the sauce before the party even started. Her subtle smile suggested that she understood just fine.

As if on cue, Merle was suddenly shoving a shot glass into both Daryl and Carol’s hands. 

“Get a move on, you’re several behind. It’s a party, remember?” Merle commanded. 

“You don’t gotta,” Daryl said quietly to Carol. She was looking at the shot glass full nearly to the brim with brown whiskey. He didn’t have a clue if she’d drank before, but if she hadn’t, straight whiskey didn’t seem like the place to start.

But the look on her face told Daryl that he might as well be talking to a brick wall. She came to the party because she thought she had something to prove. There was no way she was going to show weakness already.

She brought the glass to her pretty, pink lips, and then tipped her head back, slamming the shot in one gulp.

There were laughs of endearment from the crowd when she scrunched her nose at the taste, but she recovered quickly, clearing her throat and leaning past Merle to set her glass on the counter.

“Thank you,” she told him politely. Merle looked delighted.

Daryl threw back his own shot, not loving the bitter burning sensation sliding down his throat much himself.

“Can I get you another, sugar?” Merle asked. “Or somethin’ else? What’s your poison?” 

“Could I just get a rum and Coke, maybe?” she asked. She put on a flirty smile that Merle ate up, but seemed contrived to Daryl. The other men in the crowd were practically drooling over her, and the handful of women looked as though they were sucking on lemons as their men lusted after the younger girl, meanwhile Carol played all of them like fiddles with her coy grin and innocence that Daryl knew had to be partially feigned, and he had the fleeting desire to laugh. Was he really the only one who saw what she was doing—playing a part to trick them into thinking she belonged? 

Maybe, he realized then, it was because he was the only one who knew better. He was the only one who had seen her stripped of all the bullshit. 

Even at school she put on a performance, using a million and one different smiles to manipulate people into viewing her the way she wanted them to, but there was one place she didn’t play pretend; where she seemed one hundred percent genuine. He only knew it in retrospect that she had gifted him with more than just breakfast on those mornings in the clearing. The girl who had stood beside him and shamelessly criticized his fishing technique and then pulled on a blunt was pure Carol, raw and exposed.

He understood then that she was just as much an outcast as he was; as Michonne was. The difference was that she could pretend that she wasn’t.

“Hey,” a guy Daryl knew only as Hot Rod said then. “Anyone know if Watson’s comin’ by tonight? Fucker owes me five bucks. Excuse my language, miss.” Hot Rod shot Carol a sheepish look, and she pretended to be placated, as if she had been offended in the first place.

“Didn’t you hear?” said a woman named Penny, who Daryl couldn’t say who she’d come with because she tended to make the rounds through all the bikers. (No judgement, of course—Daryl couldn’t imagine spending prolonged time in the company of any one of those assholes.) “He shipped out last week.” 

“I thought he had a foolproof dodge plan,” said a guy who was always trying to get everyone to call him Tank, but who was actually known as Froot Loop.

“Who  _ doesn’t _ have a ‘foolproof’ dodge plan?” said Cueball, a man whose ass Daryl had, incidentally, kicked on more than one occasion at pool.

“Any man with a pair of balls on them,” Merle said bitterly. Sharpshooter, Merle’s fellow Korea vet, grunted in agreement. 

“Well,  _ I _ don’t blame anyone who tries to get out of going to war. It sounds horrible,” said Betty, (one of) Hot Rod’s girlfriends.

“Tell the truth, Dixon,” the bartender said, wiping up a spill on the counter and then slinging the towel over his shoulder. “When the draft board came for you did you seriously not try to find a way to weasel your way out?”

“Hell no, man.” Merle scoffed and took a swig of his beer. He belched and said, “No one with an ounce of dignity would try that shit. Pathetic is what them guys are, runnin’ off to Canada like a bunch of pussies. Fuck that. The US Marines put a rifle in my hands and I went to Korea and if a gook so much as entered my line of sight they was hittin’ the ground ‘fore they ever heard the bullet. Watson should be proud. Got a chance to save us from those damned communists. Right, Sharp?”

“Mhm,” Sharpshooter grunted.

“Damn straight. These kids, they got no honor. You hear about all these protests happenin’? Children spendin’ their daddies’ money to go to prissy-ass colleges so they can think they know somethin’ about somethin’. Then they go and get on TV sayin’ the war ain’t right. I say put every last one of them in the trenches and let ‘em learn what’s actually worth knowin’. I keep tellin’ Daryl here he should sign up once he’s able. Hell, I even offered to help him fake his age. Then he cold go serve his country now, instead of sittin’ in some buildin’ everyday doin’ book reports and sums for no goddamn reason.”

The talking overlapped after Merle’s tirade, some of it in agreement, some of it in opposition, and Hot Rod was saying, “I don’t give a damn about the war, but if that fucker dies over there I’m writin’ to his old lady for that money. Like, condolences or whatever, but five bucks is five bucks.”

Daryl got a beer from the bartender and then gestured for Carol to follow him, needing to get away. 

They found a free table in the far corner. The top was ambiguously sticky, but neither of them bothered to clean it off.

They didn’t say anything at first. Carol took a sip of her drink and then peered into her glass with a crease between her brows.

“He ain’t as bad as he seems sometimes,” Daryl said after a while. Carol peered up at him, a question in her eyes. “He talks a big game about the time he spent in Korea, ‘specially when he’s drunk. No doubt in my mind that we got away just in time ‘fore he started tellin’ his war stories everyone’s heard a thousand times. But if he gets too far in the bottle? He gets, I dunno, different.”

“Different how?” Carol asked softly.

“I dunno. Real sad-like, I guess. Well, no, first he gets mean—biggest asshole this side of Georgia—but another drink or two and he starts gettin’ quiet, which I’m sure it’s no surprise to you ain’t like him at all. A couple times I been stayin’ over at his place and heard him tossin’ and turnin’ in his sleep. One time we was out walkin’ and a car backfired and he just fuckin’  _ dropped _ , and the dude hates fireworks but won’t never say why. I think maybe he says all that shit he says ‘cause the war fucked him up way more than he’d ever admit, y’know?” 

“Have you tried talking to him about it?”

“Pfft, nah. That ain’t Merle. Ain’t me either, come to think of it.”

“If that’s how he feels then why does he want you to go to war so badly?”

“Dunno.” Daryl shrugged. “Pro’ly thinks that if I make it my own choice then I won’t have as bad a go with it as he did. But I ain’t doin’ that. Like, when the notice comes I’ll go, of course, but not one second before I gotta. Shit scares the livin’ hell outta me.”

Daryl blushed. He hadn’t meant to admit that, the whiskey and beer making his tongue loose. Carol, though, didn’t look at him like she thought he was a coward. If anything, she just seemed sad.

“Hey honey, why so somber?” A greasy man Daryl didn’t recognize stumbled into their table, interrupting them. He had a shot in one hand and a foul smelling blunt in the other. “Drink this, babe, see if it’ll put a smile on that pretty face.” He handed Carol the shot. She appeared to have a mental debate, before shrugging at Daryl and downing what he suspected was vodka.

“Atta girl,” said the man, putting a hand on Carol’s back. Carol, evidently not in the mood to perform for this stranger, angled away, scooting her chair closer to the wall. The man didn’t seem deterred. 

“Want a hit?” he asked, holding out the blunt. Carol went to take it, but Daryl panicked and swatted his hand out of the way. Carol started to protest, but he spoke over her.

“The fuck you think you’re doin’, makin’ eyes at my girl?” he spat. 

“ _ Your _ girl?” He turned to Carol, who looked equally as surprised. “Honey, is this really who you wanna be spending your time with? You know, I could make you feel  _ real _ good if you’d let me.” 

“You’re a ballsy fella, huh?” Daryl said before Carol had a chance to say anything. She stared at him like he’d lost his mind, but he barreled on. “Gonna try to take the girl of a Dixon brother? Good luck with that one.”

The man blanched.

“You’re Daryl Dixon?” he asked, suddenly not so cool and self-assured. Daryl let his silence speak for itself. The man held up a hand in surrender, taking a step back. “Meant no offense. Was just givin’ your pretty girl a compliment right quick.Y’all have a nice night, now.”

The man disappeared into the mix of people in the bar. The second he was gone, Daryl turned to Carol, his cheeks practically on fire.

“I’m real sorry,” he said quickly. “I figured that blunt was pro’ly laced and I didn’t want you to smoke cocaine, or worse, on accident without knowin’ you was doin it, but for some reason when people tell you not to do shit you do it anyway. The Dixon name carries weight around here, that’s the only reason I called you my girl. If anyone says somethin’ about it just tell ‘em I was tryna get that fool to leave you be. Didn’t mean to be disrespectful or nothin’, promise.” 

“Daryl, calm down, it’s alright,” Carol said. Daryl searched her face for any anger, but if anything she looked amused. “Thank you. I mean, I don’t  _ always _ do things people tell me not to do, but I appreciate your concern.”

“You kinda do,” Daryl muttered, and she laughed.

“Maybe,” she agreed. “The point is I’m not offended. The men here, they’re...very forward.”

“They’re rotten. I tried to tell you.”

“It’s nothing I can’t handle. But like...thank you. For watching out for me, I mean.”

“We’re friends,” Daryl said, but his voice was uncertain. Carol smiled, small and sweet.

“Yeah,” she said. “We are.”

Suddenly, there was a crash and they both turned in time to see a man fall off his barstool and onto the floor in a heap. 

“Oh!” Carol said, jumping to her feet, her chair scraping against the floor as her legs knocked it backwards. Daryl, watching the man with mild interest, was more surprised by her reaction than the fall itself.

“He’s fine. Pro’ly just can’t hold his liquor. Happens all the time.”

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, a couple of people came to the man’s aide and got him unsteadily to his feet. The second he was upright he was reaching for his drink.

Daryl looked up at Carol to give her a “see?” expression, but was confused to find her still standing rigid, like a deer in the headlights.

“You okay?” he asked. Swallowing, she nodded slowly.

“Yeah. I’m just gonna get some air right quick.”

She was all but bolting towards the door before Daryl had a chance to register what she even said.

With a frown, he grabbed his beer and followed.

He found her outside leaning against the building and taking deep breaths. Wordlessly, he reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out his cigarettes and a lighter. He offered her one.

“Thanks,” she muttered. She placed it between her lips and let him light it. 

Daryl got his own, and after they’d both had a few pulls he risked asking, “So, you wanna tell me what that was about?”

Carol ashed her cigarette and sighed.

“It’s stupid,” she said, shaking her head and rolling her eyes at herself.

“Doubt that’s true.”

She didn’t say anything for a while, and Daryl didn’t pressure her.

“Six months ago my mom got up at four in the morning,” she said finally. “She told my dad she had a headache and went into the kitchen to get some aspirin and water to drink it down with. I got woken up by the glass shattering, and when I went to go see what happened I found her lying on the kitchen floor unconscious. By the time we got to the hospital she was already dead. Brain aneurysm. Doctors said there was nothing we could have done.”

When she brought the cigarette back to her lips her hand was shaking.

“Most days I’m fine,” she continued. “I try not to think about it, you know? But then sometimes I get reminded, and suddenly it’s as if it just happened all over again.” She shook her head and muttered, “Stupid.”

“Ain’t stupid,” Daryl said quietly. “Happens to me, too.”

“Yeah?” She looked up at him with her wide, blue eyes, and he nodded.

“My momma died in a fire, and usually I don’t think too much about it, but then I’ll burn toast or some shit, and I’ll smell the smoke, and it’s like I’m right there watchin’ my house burn all over again, even though it was a long time ago.”

“Like your brother with the fireworks.” She thunked her head against the brick wall and gave a humorless laugh. “I guess for some people there are different kinds of wars.” 

“Guess so.” 

Carol smiled at him, reaching out and giving his hand a brief squeeze that made his stomach feel funny.

“Whaddya want to do now?” he asked, pushing the feeling down to join all the others he’d ignored. She thought about it.

“I want to get drunk,” she said decisively. “Can you help me do that?”

“Sure,” Daryl said with a laugh. “C’mon.” And he led her back into the bar.

*

Carol lay fast asleep on Merle’s crappy, old mattress, the comforter pulled halfway up her arm, revealing her bare shoulder and her pink dress that was now wrinkled with a small whisky stain above her left breast.

Daryl stood by the bed and wondered what he was supposed to do next. Merle wouldn’t be back—last he saw he was riding passenger in Andrea’s junker car—and Carol was so drunk that he doubted she’d wake up anytime soon. He’d all but carried her up the stairs to his brother’s apartment, she was so unsteady on her feet.

He still had a light buzz going, but instead of being drowsy he felt like he had a well of pent up energy thrumming through his body like electricity, and he knew he couldn’t sleep. Not yet. 

He went into the living room and pulled out the coffee table drawer, where next to Merle’s pipe and a couple rubbers Daryl had stored a few blank pages and pencils. Using a couple  _ Playboy’s _ as backing, he sat the paper on his lap and stared at it, waiting for an image to come to mind.

Usually he drew houses. There was something about the uniqueness of every house that he liked; the way they all had their own personality, made even more original by the people who lived there. He’d never lived in a place he would call a home, and so he drew homes, over and over again, different each time, and imagined he lived inside them.

But that night no images of houses came to him. His fingers itched to draw, but he didn’t know what.

Placing the tip of his pencil to the paper, he let his hand guide him. He started with lightly sketched out lines that slowly formed recognizable shapes. He didn’t think about the drawing, he simply drew it, spending nearly an hour getting the proportions and shadings just right.

It wasn’t until he was done that he had the sense to be embarrassed. He stuffed the paper inside one of the magazines, and then shoved the whole mess back into the drawer, which he pushed shut with more force than necessary. Berating himself, he curled up on the couch and breathed in the smell of old cigarette smoke, as he clamped his eyes shut and willed himself to sleep.

Eventually, he drifted off, and by morning his drawing of Carol smiling by the pond in the clearing was already forgotten.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aslkjdfa
> 
> hi. if you don’t read my other wip/don’t go on my blog (probably good choices on both counts) then you prob didn’t see me saying that i’ve been dealing with a very stupid mystery chronic illness that is making my writing go suuuuuper slow, and it’s infuriating. so if my updates take even longer than usual, it’s bc my body is not allowing me to write for very long at once. i’ve been wanting to post this for ages, but only today managed to have enough energy to do that last bit. at least it’s a fucking novel-length chapter, right? 
> 
> anyway, i’m super invested in this story now, and am excited for it to continue, so even if it takes me a while, i will be updating, i promise. umbra, too. be patient with me, plz. this time i actually have an excuse for being bad at keeping a schedule lmfao
> 
> later,  
> -diz

**Author's Note:**

> i never know what to say on first chapters besides like, "hope you liked it enough to read the next chapter!" or something. with the understanding that i've never in my life stuck to a schedule, my /goal/ is to update this biweekly (alternating between this and my other wip, "umbra"). goals are good to have, even if you don't reach them all the time, right?
> 
> anyway, i have a fever and just had 25ml of blood removed from my body and i'm not entirely sure i'm speaking english right now, so i'll just say that i hope you liked it enough to read the next chapter, which will be posted whenever it is done
> 
> deuces,  
> -diz


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